Where you manage Windows 10 pinning
Shortcut icons pinned to the taskbar and start menu in Windows 10 are managed in hidden folders in Program Data and App Data in the user folder. You can also directly manipulate the view of your Pins by adding or removing shortcut icons from the Manage Pins folder.
Taskbar pin location
Taskbar pinning is managed in the registry and Explorer folders . Pinning managed by the registry is mainly for apps that are built into Windows, and basically it is not possible to operate pinning by editing the registry. The pinning locations of added apps and folders are managed by folders, so you can directly operate pinning by adding or deleting shortcut icons.
Pinned locations managed by folders
To open a folder, you can expand it with Explorer or enter the path in the address bar to open it.
Expand File Explorer to open pinned location in taskbar
Pinned folders are set to hidden files by default, so set to show hidden files first. Setting to display hidden files
Click “View” in Explorer to display the contents related to display, so click “Hidden files” and put a check mark.
Once you have set the hidden files to be visible, click the “>” icon to expand the tree.
- Local disk (C:)
- user
- username folder
- App-Data
- Roaming
- Microsoft
- Internet Explorer
- Quick Launch
- User Pinned
and click “TaskBar” to open the pinned location.
Open taskbar pinned location from address bar
Copy the path and paste it in the address bar and press “Enter” on your keyboard.
Path: %AppData%\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Quick Launch\User Pinned\TaskBar
Pinning locations managed in the registry
If there is no shortcut icon in the folder that manages pinning on the taskbar, it is managed by the registry, so pinning cannot be performed. Open Registry Editor
- Right-click the “Windows” mark to display a menu, and click “Run” to open “Run”.
- Type regedit in the text box and click OK.
- Click Yes when the User Account Control warning appears.
- It will not be displayed if the User Account Control setting is set to “Never notify”. (Reference: Disable UAC )
Click the “>” icon of the registry key to expand it.
- HKEY_CURRENT_USER
- Software
- Microsoft
- Windows
- CurrentVersion
- Explorer
” Taskband ” in is the registry location where pinning is managed.
Please see the following page for how to back up the pinning managed by the registry.
Start menu pin location
*Administrator privileges are required to operate pinned locations common to all users. The pinned locations of the start menu common to all users and user-specific are managed in the form of hidden files, so set the display of hidden files first. It is not necessary when opening from the address bar. Setting to display hidden files
Click “View” in Explorer to display the contents related to display, so click “Hidden files” and put a check mark.
Common start menu pin location for all users
Click the “>” icon to expand the tree.
- Local disk (C:)
- Program Data
- Microsoft
- Windows
- Start Menu
If you expand and click ” Programs “, the pinning location common to all users will open.
Open from the address bar (common to all users)
path: %ProgramData%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs
Copy and paste the “path” in the address bar and press “Enter” on the keyboard.
User-specific start menu pin locations
Click the “>” icon to expand the tree.
- Local disk (C:)
- Users
- username folder
- AppData
- Roaming
- Microsoft
- Windows
- Start Menu
and click Programs to open user-specific pin locations.
Open from address bar (user-specific)
path: %AppData%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs
Copy and paste the “path” into the address bar and press “Enter” on your keyboard.